Tech

See all of New York's extravagantly designed holiday windows using Google VR

New York's annual tradition of rolling out incredibly elaborate holiday-themed store window displays in December is as much a part of the city's seasonal tourism as the Thanksgiving Day parade or New Years in Times Square.

But if you don't have the time or resources to make the trip, you can now get a taste of the city's art-meets-holiday spirit via immersive experiences offered by Google.

The company teamed up with 18 of the best known New York retail stores with holiday displays and produced an online and mobile interactive tour of the most stunning store windows this season.

And these aren't just small, experimental displays. The list of participating stores includes some of the most famously impressive holiday windows, including displays from Macy's, Bloomingdale's, Saks Fifth Avenue, Lord & Taylor, Ralph Lauren, Louis Vuitton, Tiffany, Burberry and Bergdorf Goodman, as well as newer brands (compared to the others) such as Michael Kors and Tory Burch.

The experience is called Window Wonderland, with most of the displays offering an audio narrative from the window's creative director. Along with narration, the windows offer 360-degree panoramic images as well as high-resolution galleries that essentially allow you to "walk" past the windows in much the same way as you might if you were actually in New York.

Image: google

All of the windows are impressive and a celebrity display from Barneys includes designs from Trey Parker and Matt Stone of South Park.

The New York holiday window display tradition is more than 100 years old, with some of the earliest elaborate displays appearing in the mid-19th century in Macy's department store windows. Now, in the 21st century, you can enjoy the city's holiday treats using either Google Cardboard, Google Daydream or your browser.

BONUS: Wes Anderson’s H&M Christmas ad is what we need this holiday season

Mashable
is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. Powered by its own proprietary technology, Mashable is the go-to source for tech, digital culture and entertainment content for its dedicated and influential audience around the globe.